


A Calm & Quiet Place

by svecounia



Category: KÀ - Cirque du Soleil
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Hot Springs & Onsen, Seasonal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:21:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28184562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/svecounia/pseuds/svecounia
Summary: The Counselor's Son and Twin Sister spend a chilly night at the Mountain Den hot springs.
Relationships: Counselor's Son/Twin Sister (Kà)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 3





	A Calm & Quiet Place

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Half_an_Empress](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Half_an_Empress/gifts).



The mineral-rich water reminded her of the perfumed baths of the Imperial palace, creamy with milk and honey and herbs. She pulled her hand through it, back and forth, letting it flow silken through her splayed fingers as fog lifted gently above the steamy surface and softened the natural jagged edges of the cavern. Every so often Jimaya felt a flicker of understanding for the beauty Rensai claimed to see in the Mountain Den. They were rare but unmistakable. And watching him close his eyes and lean his head back, hair tied up high and loose to keep it out of the water, she felt one glow to life like an ember on kindling. He felt her stare, smiled, and peeked an eye open. 

"Come here. Unless you'd rather go on admiring me."

She slipped beneath his waiting arm. Rensai touched an absentminded kiss to her head and relaxed back again. He became insufferable when she told him, but she really did love him like this, lazy and languid, as though he could spread a single hour across an entire week like too much paint across a canvas. The heat coaxed her muscles looser. She sighed contentedly and closed her eyes.

"We should move to the other side," he said after a long while. 

"Hm?" Jimaya lifted her head muzzily from his shoulder. She'd nearly dozed off. "Other side of what?"

"The spring." 

Jimaya looked around the round, rough hewn hollow, puzzled. There was no other side, at least not one that looked dramatically different from where they sat now. But water sloshed as Rensai got to his feet. Steam radiated from his back and shoulders like it might lift the tattoos from his skin, and he dipped a hand into the water to feel a ways along the cavern wall. 

"There's a tunnel. Ah." He reached further underwater and paused. "Here."

Jimaya blanched, a remarkable feat when the springs had heated her cheeks to a comfortable flush. Her skin felt suddenly slick, nearly slimy, and she chafed her arms uneasily against it. 

"It's not far," Rensai reassured her as though fully submerging herself in hot, opaque water were the most normal thing in the world. "You'll be fine."

She wasn't so certain. She'd spent enough time underwater to want to avoid it at all costs, and that was without the added pressure of tons upon tons of volcanic rock between herself and fresh air. Her last bad experience had felt crushing and impossibly wide, but this one felt far, far too narrow. She edged closer until she was pressed apprehensively against him, staring down the water's surface as though she'd suddenly see through it. He wouldn't lead her somewhere actually dangerous. 

Rensai turned her face to his and bent to touch a warm, delicate kiss to her cheek. Her eyes fluttered closed, but before she could react he'd pulled away and ducked beneath the water's steaming surface. She could see his hair swirl in a dark twist behind him, followed by the pallid bottoms of his feet, then nothing. Only faint ripples and a handful of bubbles hinted at where he'd gone. 

Jimaya whined in distressed aggravation. Stupid, typical Rensai. Just when she'd been foolish enough to relax, he took it as his cue to drag her beyond comfort's border. She crossed her arms over her chest and fretted, casting a reluctant look back at the steamy cavern he'd just left behind. The heated haze hung heavily beneath the stalactites above, lit to a golden glow by the torchlight. It was close and warm, romantic even, until she'd been _abandoned_ at the first opportunity. Without him a chill swept over her skin, and she stooped lower until the water washed over her shoulders. 

"Rensai."

No reply. 

_"Rensai."_

Still nothing. Fuming hot enough to heat the water a couple of extra degrees, Jimaya pinched her nose and ducked beneath the surface before fear could convince her otherwise.

Her lungs constricted the moment water closed over her head. As she felt blindly for the way forward, choking dread brushed aside her defenses and seized hold of her heart. Her hand found the top of the tunnel and she kicked forward, but there was no telling how far she had to go or how long she'd need to be under. Her heartbeat began to pound in her ears and she parted the water in front of her with desperate claws of her hands, eyes squeezed shut, braced for the crushing roll of ocean waves until––

Rensai's hands closed gently over hers and guided her upwards.

Frigid air greeted her face as she broke the surface of the water. She gasped out and clung to him, shaking. 

"Don't–– don't make me do that again," she whispered. A violent shudder passed through her. Slowly she let him ease her back into the water until warmth wrapped her back up again. 

"I'm sorry. I would have led you if I'd known you'd hate it that much." He kissed her ear and she looped her arms around his neck instead. His presence was already steadying her breaths, his voice was a low, reassuring rumble. "Are you all right?"

She nodded against his shoulder. His skin and touch were soft beneath the water. He pulled her close and kissed her properly this time, deep and soothing, until her anxiety began to drift beyond her reach. 

When at last she opened her eyes she was sure he'd left her dazed enough to see stars. But they didn't fade, and with a sharp gasp of awareness she realized they were bobbing beneath an impossibly clear stretch of night sky. Countless stars dotted the indigo-black above them, great handfuls of diamonds flung across velvet. Beneath that, past the jagged ruffle of miles of shadowy forest, the lights of the Imperial City glowed in the distance. The hot spring's steam lifted higher than ever in the icy winter air, blurring the edges of their world, folding them inward, as though all that was or mattered was right within reach. 

"Oh," Jimaya breathed. "It's beautiful."

"Very," he agreed softly, but he was looking nowhere near the sky when he brushed his lips against her throat. 

She loved him like this, she thought again as he gathered her in his arms. As though they had a second for every star and a star for every second, glittering and innumerable. She tore her eyes from the sky only long enough to kiss him, only stopped kissing him long enough to pant his name. He was saying something else, breathy and low in her ear, some string of promises like he so often did. And like usual she was too swept away to hold onto them for more than a few seconds, too certain she'd have another chance to hear them. His mouth heated her skin like a brand, then left it flushed and freezing when he pulled away and the night air rushed in to fill the space he'd left behind. But he never left her reeling for long: she whined for him and reached, desperate for more of him, and she felt in his touch that he was powerless but to comply. His hand was at her back when she arched away from him, her call of his name lost to the cloudless sky. Their gasping breaths mingled with the steam.

Eventually the water stilled and their heartbeats slowed again. Jimaya settled back against Rensai's chest and sighed, her senses as hazy as the treetops through the steam. He wound his arms around her and they drifted like that for a while, faces turned towards the stars.

"Oh, every tea in the water garden."

"The afternoon in the throne room." His lips turned up against her neck. 

"Falling asleep in front of your fire."

"Finally teaching you Denborn archery."

"When Omare beat you at dice."

"I've told you a hundred times, a lucky win is hardly a win at all," Rensai muttered, and Jimaya laughed. 

Their game hit another pause after that and they fell into another easy silence. Jimaya had plenty more to add to her list but they were much harder to describe, images more than moments, and fine to keep to herself instead. The specific kind of irritation he reserved for when they fell asleep so late and exhausted that he forgot to take down his hair and woke up to find it dented. Suppressing laughter in court when she accidentally met his gaze and spotted a snide comment barely trapped behind his teeth. The brittle, fixed smile he wore whenever the Firefly Boy visited, and the utter exhaustion that followed when it was over and Rensai was finally allowed to drop the act.

The loose way he held her, like it was their mutual choice that kept her close more than his arms. She could drift away whenever she chose, but he trusted her to linger instead. 

Jimaya flicked a glance up at him. He was ruminant, staring across the treeline at the distant lights. Ever caught between Den and City. Belonging to neither. She rose up and kissed his jaw. He could belong to her instead.

He drew breath to speak but was cut off by a distant boom, and he smiled. Beyond the forest, fireworks were erupting above the Imperial City in great blooms of gold, pink, and green. What must have looked massive within the city walls was smaller than the tufts of dandelions at their distance, sparkles scattering like seeds on a careless breath. Rensai squeezed her close and tucked her head beneath his chin. 

"Happy New Year, Jimaya."

**Author's Note:**

> For A+M, without whom I would be a vastly different writer. Thank you for your support and encouragement during an incredibly challenging stretch of quarantime. Our collaborations have meant so much to me and I can't wait to see what else we inspire, tease, or otherwise bully out of each other.


End file.
